Background- Brazil1 Brazil Is the Largest Country in South

Background- Brazil1 Brazil is the largest country in South America by both size and population (est. 200 million, 2016). For much of its history, it struggled with government repression and corruption. In the 1960s and 1970s, Brazil’s military dictatorship arrested and disappeared leftists. Although Brazil returned to democracy in the 1980s, it has failed to prosecute the human rights violations committed by the dictatorship and murders and police harassment of human rights, worker’s rights, and environmentalist activists remain common. Additionally, Brazil’s activists, prosecutors, and judges are in the midst of a battle to uproot long-standing corruption, leading to the fall of two presidents in recent years and many other high-level political figures. Uniquely in Latin America, Brazil is a former Portuguese colony that achieved independence under the continued leadership of Portugal’s monarchy. After Christopher Columbus’ first journey to Latin America in 1492, Spain sought to establish exclusive rights to the Americas against other European powers, and especially against Portugal’s entrepreneurial naval explorers. After mediation by the Pope, Spain and Portugal negotiated an agreement (Treaty of Tordesillas) giving Spain rights to all lands west of 46° 30′ W and Portugal rights to all lands to the east. In 1500, Portuguese explorers reached Brazil, then inhabited by two to six million hunter-gatherers, fishers, and farmers. The Portuguese king granted large tracts of Brazilian land to favored courtiers, known as donatários, who established sugar plantations worked by both indigenous and African slaves. As time went on, the Portuguese pushed farther into the interior, well past the originally agreed upon boundary with Spain. Ranchers sought new land for their cattle. Bandeirantes (explorers) searched for precious metals to mine and indigenous peoples to enslave. Jesuits also searched for indigenous peoples, who they converted, resettled on aldeias (missions), and armed against the bandeirantes. In 1659, the bandeirantes found first gold and then diamonds, prompting a gold rush into the interior. As Brazil expanded, it grew increasingly frustrated with Portugal, which failed to prevent repeated French and Dutch incursions on Brazilian territory and was itself temporarily absorbed by Spain. In the early 1800s, Napoleon conquered both Spain and Portugal, which most of Spanish Latin America used as a pretext to declare independence, ostensibly in support of the Spanish monarchy. However, the Portuguese prince regent, Dom João, forestalled this possibility by fleeing to Brazil, establishing his government in Rio de Janeiro, and implementing reforms benefiting Brazilians, including allowing Brazilians to begin manufacturing their own goods instead of importing them from Portugal, allowing Brazilians to trade with countries other than Portugal, and declaring Brazil coequal with Portugal. After Napoleon was defeated and Dom João inherited the throne, he returned to Portugal but left his own son, Dom Pedro, as the new prince regent. The Portuguese parliament demanded the repeal of the reforms benefiting Brazil and the return of Dom Pedro to Portugal. Dom Pedro refused, announcing “Fico” (“I am staying”), and declaring himself emperor of the newly independent Brazil in 1822. Following independence, Brazil gradually transitioned from an economy based on sugar plantations farmed by slaves to an economy based on coffee plantations farmed by free, but often 1 Caitlin Hunter, Author, Foreign and International Law Librarian at Loyola Law School; Erin Gonzalez, Chief IACHR Editor; Cesare Romano, Faculty Advisor exploited, workers. Pedro squandered his initial popularity by violently putting down revolts, dissolving the legislature, exiling opponents, and failing to prevent a southern province from achieving independence as the new nation of Uruguay. He also angered sugar plantation owners by agreeing to phase out the importation of slaves. In 1831, he abdicated in favor of his 5 year old son, Pedro II, prompting a rebellious, chaotic regency that ended with Pedro II’s ascent as emperor at just 14. Despite these difficult circumstances, Pedro II established a reputation as intelligent, kind, and humble. In 1870, Brazil joined the War of the Triple Alliance, which began after Paraguay’s dictator unwisely declared war on Brazil, Uruguay, and Argentina simultaneously. The war devastated Paraguay and distracted Brazil’s army from recapturing escaped slaves. By the 1870s, the number of free Afro-Brazilians outstripped the number of slaves. In 1874, Pedro II declared that henceforth all children born to slaves would be free and, in 1888, the princess regent declared the freedom of Brazil’s 700,000 remaining slaves. Brazil’s economy shifted from the northeastern sugar plantations to the southeastern coffee plantations. In 1889, the military forced Pedro II into exile, paving the way for a democracy run by a series of “coffee presidents.” These presidents successfully expanded Brazil’s territory and economy, encouraging immigration and urbanization. However, they also protected the interests of the coffee farmers over ordinary workers and were elected by a highly restricted pool of eligible voters amidst widespread voter fraud. In the early 1900s, resentment over the government’s corruption and the mistreatment of workers led to the instatement of new governments that promised better treatment for workers but struggled to control corruption and the economy. Throughout the 1920s, junior army officers known as tenentes (“lieutenants”) staged uprisings in favor of stronger central government, nationalization of natural resources, and greater protections for workers. In 1930, the government was finally overthrown by Getúlio Vargas, a civilian politician who had lost that year’s presidential election. Although dictatorial, Vargas implemented popularly demanded protections for workers, greater centralization, and universal suffrage. He also expanded industrialization, increased education, and nationalized the petroleum industry under Petrobrás. Although the military forced Vargas from power in 1945, the popularity of his programs allowed him to return to power as Brazil’s democratically elected president in 1950. However, Vargas struggled to govern without dictatorial powers and, in the early 1950s, inflation spiraled and corruption flourished. In 1954, Vargas was implicated in a plot to assassinate his political opponents and killed himself rather than resign. Vargas’ death engendered sympathy and helped ensure the presidential win of his protégé, Juscelino Kubitschek De Oliveira. Kubitschek expanded petroleum production and engaged in extensive infrastructure projects, building highways, hydroelectric projects, and the new capital: Brasília. Although these projects helped modernize Brazil, they also generated enormous expense, made worse by unchecked corruption. Brazil’s foreign debt doubled and the cost of living tripled and, in 1960, voters elected Jânio Quadros, a longtime opponent of Vargas and Kubitschek. However, Quadros resigned after only 7 months in power, citing “terrible forces” working against him, and leaving the presidency to Kubitschek’s former vice president, João Goulart. Armed conflict almost broke out over whether to allow Goulart to assume office. After a tense week, the legislature and the military agreed that Goulart could assume the presidency on the condition that Brazil shifted to a parliamentary system in which real power was held by the prime minister. Goulart accepted the presidency, then persuaded the public to vote to restore his presidential powers. Embroiled in power struggles, Goulart and the legislature could not govern effectively and allowed inflation to triple the cost of living and decrease the currency to a tenth of its former value. Positions on both sides hardened, with Goulart moving farther left and his political opponents and the military moving father to the right. In 1964, the political conflict culminated in the institution of a military dictatorship. In March of 1964, Goulart instituted agrarian reform, nationalized private oil refineries, and refused to suppress a military strike. The military leadership and conservative politicians rebelled, forced Goulart into exile, and instituted a dictatorship that cracked down on leftists. The government passed a series of institutional acts and constitutional reforms that allowed the military to remove elected officials, exile and abrogate the political rights of “subversives,” and try civilians in military courts. Soon, the government abrogated the rights of hundreds and arrested thousands. When the military’s chosen president refused to annul local elections won by the opposition, the military leadership threatened to remove him, then banned all parties except for their own artificially created government party, the National Renewal Alliance (Aliança Renovadora Nacional; ARENA), and an artificially created opposition party, the Brazilian Democratic Movement (Movimento Democrático Brasileiro; MDB). The ARENA candidate was elected unopposed after the opposition refused to participate in the farce by nominating their own candidate. Antigovernment demonstrators protested and the Communist Party of Brazil went further, creating the Araguaia Guerrilla Movement (“Guerrilha do Araguaia.”) In response, the government issued 1968’s Fifth Institutional Act, dissolving Congress and authorizing further crackdowns on opponents. From 1972 to 1975, the state disappeared

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